We had an early Sunday morning breakfast at the Hotel Silberhorn in Lauterbrunnan and packed our car for the trip to the airport in Zurich. I'm going to miss the wonderful breakfasts at the Silberhorn.
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| Choice of delicious fresh baked breads to accompany our morning breakfast |
Sunday morning traffic was light on the Autobahn and we arrived at the Zurich airport with plenty of time for our 1 PM flight to Vienna. The airport itself is quite spacious with much shopping, restaurants and a host of amenities. It's one of the nicer airports we have been through. Our airline is Nikki which is owned by Air Berlin. I chose this carrier because they flew the reliable and comfortable Airbus 320 over the Alps. The onboard staff were very young women which was surprising in this day and age of flight attendants looking matronly. European airlines still serve meals. We had a turkey sandwich for lunch onboard during the one and one half hour on time flight to Vienna.
Once we landed in Vienna we we stopped at a convenient kiosk selling SIM cards for smartphones. I was actually going to look for them in the airport but it was more convenient to run into them in our path. The phone company representative was quite helpful in changing the card in our smartphone to the Austrian Phone system, then taking us to a window where we were able to get a fixed price limo ride into the city. The rep even told us not to change money in the airport since it is cheaper to do it in town. We took his advice and saved a few dollars.
Home for our stay in Vienna is the Mercure Secession Hotel. Location of this facility is great, it's only one block from the NaschMarket and a short walk to the Ringstrasse and the Vienna state Opera.
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| Hotel Mercure Secession |
I'm not sure how we got so lucky but we had a small suite overlooking the Secession Art Museum.
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| Our very nice room serves us well in Vienna |
After checking in and settling down with our bags we set out to explore Vienna.
In the 13th Century a great wall was built around the city complete with moat to protect the city from invaders. By the time of the 18th Century the wall had become obsolete and the Emperor, Franz Josef, ordered the wall to be torn down. The moat was filled in and in place of the Wall the Emperor designed a wide tree lined street along with the exact location of buildings to showcase the grandeur of the Hapsburg Empire. The wide street is known as the RingStrasse or "Ring Street". Two blocks from our hotel is the RingStrasse and the first of these buildings we encountered, The Vienna State Opera. This institution is one of the main reasons we are here in Vienna and staying at this location.
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| Front of Vienna State Opera on the RingStrasse |
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| Vienna State Opera Side view |
Continuing our walk to the City center after jhaving crossed the RingStrasse and walked down the street adjacent to the Opera House we encounter the museum of European Impressionist Art, The Albertina.
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| Albertina Museum of Impressionist Art |
In the center of the City you can see the massive tpwers of St Stephens Cathedral. This Church is the MAin Church of the Catholic Archdiocese of Vienna. The original church was built in 1147, wow!
Over the years various structures replaced the previous church until the present church was constructed beginning in 1368. Construction lasted 65 years. World War II spared the church from Allied bombings but the roof caught fire from the adjacent buildings which burned. The roof ended up collapsing but the surrounding masonry structure was massive enough to survive intact. Rebuilding after WW II was completed in 1952.
We walked into the Cathedral and looked around along with many other tourists and continued our walk.
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| St Stephens Cathedral |
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| This seemed to me a massive collection of candles |
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| Interior of St Stephens |
While on the square at St Stephens we found a money changer that was opened on Sunday and picked up a few Euros in exchange for USD. The rate has become more favorable than it has been in the past few years, about 0.90 Euros per dollar.
We continued past the Cathedral and made our way to the Danube River. While we were on the square we ended up purchasing an umbrella because it started raining.
Fortunately the rain was over by the end of dinner. As we made our way back we heard sounds coming from the Opera House vicinity. They were showing the stage activity on the outside HD screen. It was "The Tempest", a very modern English opera based on the Shakespeare play. We took a seat and watched a while.
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| The Opera performance from inside the House is shown outside on the HD screen |
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| Opera audience despite the wet seats |
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| Even Mozart was outside the Opera House |
